Circled Heart (4 page)

I laughed. “That’s humbling but probably very true. Mayville’s been cooking all day and you’d regret missing the feast. How do you manage to find three square meals a day while living the bachelor life?”

“My landlady takes care of that necessity, but I could cook if I had to.”

“Which,” I responded honestly, “is more than I can say for myself.”

“You’ll have to marry a rich man then, so you won’t need to bother with tedious domestic duties.”

“I don’t have to marry at all, Allen.” I responded with a smile to take any sting from the words. “An old woman I met in hospital in London once told me that only a very good husband was better than no husband at all and sternly warned me to stay clear of the blessed estate because mighty good husbands were few and far between.”

“That seems unfairly cynical to males. Do you agree with her, Johanna?”

The conversation had taken an awkward twist, and I wasn’t sure how to respond, so I welcomed Uncle Hal’s entrance and his invitation to gather in the dining room.

“Here’s your buffet, Allen. You were right to anticipate it. Mayville never does anything halfway.”

“It’s not like you to avoid a subject, Johanna. You didn’t answer my last question.”

“You’re right. I didn’t,” I admitted, laughing, “and now I’m being summoned by my aunt, so I’m not answering it a second time.”

Later in the evening Grandmother took my arm and drew me to a woman standing quietly to the side.

“I’d like you to meet my friend Kate Harwood Barrett, Johanna.” The woman was perhaps ten years younger than my grandmother with white hair and clear, dark eyes.

“How do you do?” I took her extended hand and racked my brain for some faint memory of the name.

“No, Johanna, you’ve never met Mrs. Barrett before so you may relax.” Occasionally I was grateful for my grandmother’s clairvoyance because it saved me a great deal of mental energy. “Your grandfather handled the Crittentons’ legal affairs for their Chicago venture, and I had the pleasure of meeting Kate when she was appointed to head their national mission.”

“Are you affiliated with the organization that sponsors the Florence Crittenton homes?” I inquired.

Kate Barrett smiled. “Yes, for nearly the last three years. Apparently you’ve heard of us,” a slight inquisitive lift at the end of her words.

“I took my degree in social work from Bryn Mawr. We studied your philosophy and mission.”

“Which was—?”

“To provide a home for prostitutes and help them find useful work.”

“Certainly that was the foundation on which Mr. Crittenton established the first home in New York thirty years ago. Now, though, I see a shift in emphasis. We have found that unwed mothers and other destitute women also need a home and practical skills. The future of our organization lies in expanding our social services, and I believe Mr. Crittenton would approve.” Mrs. Barrett spoke decisively in a voice moderated with a southern softness. “Your grandmother speaks very highly of your credentials, Miss Swan. What are your future plans?”

I was embarrassed but answered honestly, “At the moment I don’t have any. I suppose I’ll try to find work at one of our local hospitals, Mrs. Barrett.”

“Doctor Barrett,” Grandmother corrected gently.

I looked at the woman. “Medical doctor?”

“I’m a doctor of obstetrics, Miss Swan, which is why, I suppose, I feel so strongly about the need to help indigent and unwed mothers. Are you aware there is a Crittenton Home here in Chicago?”

“No.”

“The Anchorage Home is located on Indiana Avenue and run by a very good and competent woman named Hilda Cartwright. I’d like you to meet her.”

“Why?” My grandmother gave a quiet sigh at my blunt question.

“Because you are an intelligent woman with very fine qualifications and your grandmother assures me you have a practical compassion as well. Such a combination could prove very valuable. The Anchorage has any number of do-gooders who volunteer there because, I fear, it gives them a faint sense of superiority. I’m sure they would vehemently deny that fact, but I was not comfortable with some of the people I saw there recently. You I would be comfortable with and your background in both social services and nursing is as perfect as it gets. Are you willing to at least see what we’re all about?”

I confess, I was not immediately enthusiastic. The vision of a Gothic-style house with unfortunate, pregnant, abused, downtrodden, and abandoned girls locked in the attic held no attraction.

But then I met Kate Barrett’s dark eyes, serious and challenging me to answer, and in spite of myself replied, “Yes. What about a Monday morning visit?”

“Monday is fine. I’ll let Hilda know to expect you.” She and my grandmother exchanged a look before she asked about London and we moved onto another topic. When a man stopped to introduce himself to Dr. Barrett, I drifted away with Grandmother.

“Thank you,” I told her.

Because she always understood me, Grandmother immediately responded, “Kate Barrett is a remarkable woman and I knew Charles Crittenton. Richard considered him a good man and his organization highly respectable.”

“Grandfather was an expert judge of character.”

“Yes. He had a legal mind, sharp and uncluttered by excessive emotion. Unlike you, Johanna.”

“I’m not sentimental,” I replied indignantly.

“I didn’t say sentimental. I said emotional, and you are that, whatever appearance you choose to show the world. I think the Anchorage might be a good place for you, somewhere you can put all your energy to valuable use. Might even give you dragons to slay.”

“You think I need dragons to be happy?”

“You have always needed to feel challenged, the greater the odds against you and the more forceful your opponent, the better. Exactly like your mother.” Her voice softened at the last word, unusual for her, and then she said briskly, “I see Kitty’s cousins are coming our way to offer their good-byes. The evening must be officially over.” We shared a smile and turned together to say good night.

When Allen approached with his coat over his arm, I walked with him out onto the porch and down the front steps.

“I’m glad you came,” I told him, “even if it was the buffet that drew you.” He seemed more animated than usual, happy and boyishly good-looking.

“Not just the buffet,” he responded. He looked past me at the large front window through which we could see people still mingling and chatting in the elegant front room. “I’ve always liked your family, Johanna, but now even more so since they saw fit to give you such a pleasant homecoming.” He turned back to me and leaned to kiss me lightly on the cheek, another chaste and boring display of affection. He might as well have patted me on top of my head and handed me a lollipop. “I’m glad you’re home. Perhaps we’ll be able to see more of each other now.”

Something in his voice seemed not quite right for a moment, a tentative or even mystified tone, and I looked at him quickly. There was nothing to be seen on his face, however, except his usual attentive and kind expression.

“I hope so, but I may have found something to keep myself occupied for a while.” I told him of my planned visit to the Anchorage Home on Indiana Street.

“Does that work appeal to you?”

I shrugged and answered, “I can’t say. I have completely unworthy notions of such a place but I’m going with an open mind. It is 1912, you know, not 1812. The times are different and people more accepting. Society has changed for the better.”

“Is that what you believe, Johanna?”

“You don’t?”

“I don’t fool myself with your progressive ideas. People weren’t very forgiving in 1812, and they’re no more forgiving a hundred years later. Good night.” He went down the walk and I turned back into the house, surprised and taken aback by the fervor in his voice. For a moment I felt foolish and childish, heard in Allen’s tone a rebuke I didn’t understand. I had never experienced even a mild chastisement from him before, and perhaps my surprise was proof of what he implied, that I was unrealistic and did not really know people at all. Jennie came to the door and called my name from the doorway.

“I’m coming.” I turned to look at her, appreciating how the porch light flushed her complexion and gave sparkle to her eyes.

“People are asking where you disappeared to,” she chided affectionately.

“Tell them into the night, Jen. Tell them I’ve run away to join the circus or take to the stage. Tell them I’ve gone to seek my fortune.” She held the door open for me as I came back inside and put an arm around my shoulders for a quick hug as I passed her.

“You must have forgotten you already have a fortune. Stop speaking in riddles, Johanna, and come say good night to your friends. For the smart one in the family, you sometimes make no sense at all.”

She said it all with a smile, her tone cool and practical and matter-of-fact. As I followed her into the front room, I was conscious of an odd reversal, Jennie suddenly decisive and mature and I childish and uncertain, an untried girl longing for something she could not name and did not understand.

* * *

Monday I took the train to Indiana Street.

“Levi could very easily drive you,” Grandmother pointed out with a touch of asperity as I pinned on my hat.

Hats were a necessary fashion evil that I always thought looked ridiculous on me. Small straw boaters made me resemble a child ready for the seashore. Large flamboyant versions overwhelmed my short hair and small stature so that a good wind off the lake using the hat as a sail could surely lift me up and blow me all the way to my destination. In the mirror I wrinkled my nose at my reflection with its sharp chin and big eyes.

I could do no more about those unfashionable physical attributes than I could about the hat, so I jammed in a last pin and turned to say, “How would it look if I drove up to a home for destitute and desperate women in a chauffeured automobile? I’d be embarrassed. Besides, I like the train and the passing parade of people. I liked your friend Dr. Barrett, too, by the way, so thank you for the introduction, and don’t wait on me for lunch. I may plan a couple of side trips along the way.”

Since the first day I crossed my grandparents’ threshold, Grandmother never protested my independence or expressed a worry. When I told her I was accepted by Bryn Mawr College in Philadelphia, she nodded and went back to the newspaper she was reading. When I informed her of my acceptance into the Florence Nightingale School of Nursing in London, she asked only when I would be leaving and how long I would be gone. It was more a matter of respect and trust than a lack of love or concern on her part. From the beginning she understood how to handle me with few missteps. Although a few of those had occurred through the years—on my part as well as hers—we never spoke of the altercations now, and I could hardly remember what all the fuss had been about. When Grandfather was alive, he had little patience for brawling women, as he phrased it. He argued cases in court, he said, and he was not about to come home to more arguments. Because Grandmother and I both loved him, we were always able to put aside our differences; and after a while whatever our issue had been quietly faded away.

The Anchorage Home was nothing like I pictured, not a brooding Gothic mansion with wrought iron railings and small, dark windows. Probably not a madwoman held captive in the attic, either, I thought, laughing at myself, although that remained to be seen. Instead, the house was neat red brick, the trim painted dark brown, windows showing frilly white curtains to the outside and the front yard surrounded by a pristine white fence. A perfectly domestic appearance, almost disappointing in its ordinariness.

A short, stout woman opened the door to my knock and gave me a frank look from head to toe. Because I appeared neither destitute nor despairing, she guessed correctly.

“You must be Miss Swan. Matron said to expect you this morning.”

Inside, the hallway smelled like lemons and the wood and windows shone. The curtains I had seen from the outside hung crisp and clean, and fresh flowers filled a vase on a table by the front door. This could be anyone’s comfortable home, I thought, and followed that with the immediate realization that it was someone’s home, even if only temporary. Looking around, I felt inordinately glad that the environment was so bright and welcoming. If I were in trouble, pregnant, unmarried and cast out by my family, fleeing a husband who beat me, or widowed and poverty-stricken, alone and ill, any of the situations that befell a woman in a man’s world, I would not be afraid to come here. It bespoke a woman’s touch and said welcome.

Hilda Cartwright, Matron to the woman who first greeted me, came out a door at the end of the hallway and walked toward me. She was tall and walked with a slight limp, an innate dignity in her frank gaze, upright bearing, and sincere smile.

“Miss Swan, I’m Hilda Cartwright. Kate said you promised to visit. Come into my office, please. Eulalie, would you bring Miss Swan a cup of tea? If you walked from the station, you had a bit of a hike.” She stated everything calmly and I thought her temperament exactly right for the work she did. There was something reassuring about her voice and manner, a combination of tranquility and kindness that made one trust her judgment without knowing her at all.

Miss Cartwright’s study was utilitarian at best, with plain curtains, an unadorned square desk, and shelves of books. Later I would find out that the room was a reflection of the woman, nothing ornamental about her either, every thought, word, and action directed to a practical objective.

She sat across the desk from me, examining me with her very fine gray eyes for a silent moment, then said, “You come highly recommended, Miss Swan, as a gifted student and a young woman of purpose. I spoke to Sally Gray, one of your college teachers, and she sang your praises to the heavens. I admit, however, that she also warned me about your stubborn streak, said you do not take correction well if you believe it to be unwarranted, and that you would rather make a wrong decision than no decision at all.”

“She’s right on all counts, but it’s still humbling to have one’s flaws enumerated like a shopping list. I had so much to learn then. I still do,” I added at Hilda Cartwright’s look, “but in my first year at college, I was almost beyond redemption, always opening my mouth and blurting out wrong answers and speaking without listening. Fortunately, Miss Gray saw that I meant well, took me under her wing, and with great patience taught me—as she called it—to listen between the lines. I have the warmest regard for Miss Gray. I hope she’s well.”